ITV Sport's Jacob Steinberg picks out the less-popular elements in South Africa this summer...
Jabulani
It's said a bad workman blames his tools, but in this case we aim only to blame those who created this impediment to long-range shooting. Previously heralded players were made to resemble a bunch of amateurish clodhoppers by a ball that had more bounce than a cheque from Portsmouth FC and regularly flew miles over the bar from free-kicks. Only a few attackers, such as Diego Forlan, mastered its dip and swerve. The rest left South Africa having been thoroughly Jabulanied.
Vuvuzelas
Ok, yes, it’s rude to sniff at other cultures. But come on. Really? This is what people wanted to hear throughout every game of the World Cup? Quite simply these ear-splitting bee-imitators prevented any atmosphere.
France
At least France can pull off a shambles with a certain panache and a casual shrug of the shoulders. They’ve got a manager, Raymond Domenech, who picks his team based on the respective star signs of his players. A star striker, Nicolas Anelka, who swears at the coach during half-time of a key match with Mexico and is subsequently expelled from the squad. A captain, Patrice Evra, who calls a strike the day before their final match in protest at Anelka’s expulsion. A team that finished below South Africa. And to cap it all off, they shouldn’t even have been there in the first place, only qualifying for the World Cup thanks to Thierry Henry’s handball against the Republic of Ireland.
Luis Suarez
With the score still level in the last minute of extra-time in Uruguay’s quarter-final with Ghana, the striker stopped Dominic Adiyiah's header on the line with his hand, taking the inevitable red card and calculating that Asamoah Gyan would miss his penalty for the west Africans. The gamble paid off as Gyan crashed his penalty against the bar and Uruguay won the subsequent shoot-out. Even more gallingly, Suarez manically celebrated Uruguay’s win on the touchline. As Africa wept for Ghana, the rest of the world united in sanctimonious wailing and Fifa discussed adding an extra game to Suarez’s one-match ban, the striker lapped up his anti-hero status, chuckled with all the malice of a cartoon villain and declared: "The Hand of God now belongs to me. Mine is the real Hand Of God."
John Terry
"If it upsets him then I'm on the verge of just saying, 'So what'?" So blustered tub-thumbing John Terry when revealing how he was going to take on England’s coach Fabio Capello in a roundtable discussion about the team’s tactics. Terry was right to display such bullishness – he had, after all, heroically secured a beer for the boys already so was typically emboldened in an astonishing press conference. Terry, though, lost the run of himself and ended up naming a group of players who he assumed shared his grievances. Only these players, it transpired, weren’t too happy about being named and shamed and distanced themselves from Terry. It later emerged that Terry stayed schtum in the team meeting and Capello revealed that the defender had made a "very big mistake" the next day. So what?
Sepp Blatter
Goal-line technology please, Sepp! There's a good chap.
Felipe Melo
Brazil, along with Spain, were the favourites ahead of the World Cup and everything was going swimmingly for them until they met Holland in the last eight. For a while they were coasting thanks to Robinho’s opener. And out of nothing, they imploded in quite stunning fashion. First Melo unwittingly gave Holland an equalizer when he headed in Wesley Sneijder’s cross. Shortly afterwards Sneijder headed Holland into an unlikely lead and suddenly Brazil were trailing. Yet any hopes they had of rescuing their tournament evaporated when Melo was sent off for a stamp on Arjen Robben and Brazil were out.
Mark van Bommel
The Holland midfielder committed 14 fouls – and that’s just the ones the referees blew for – at this World Cup without even the slightest threat of being booked. However, he was cautioned for dissent in stoppage time in the semi-final win over Uruguay. Van Bommel is spiky and confrontational. He kicks, he trips, he snarls and he winds up opposing players. Maybe every team needs someone like him. But we don’t have to praise him, even if his glittering record demands it: Van Bommel is successful to an infuriating degree, having won several titles in Holland, Germany and Spain, not to mention the Champions League with Barcelona.
Kader Keita
Some say Kaka’s sending off for, well, nothing was karmic retribution for Rivaldo’s play-acting against Turkey in the 2002 World Cup. An eye for an eye and all that. But an already ugly match against the Ivory Coast became even more squalid when Keita got the Brazil midfielder sent off when he ran into him and went down clutching his face as if Kaka had swung an elbow. He hadn’t, he’d just braced himself for the impending collision. A fat lot of good it did the Ivorians though, who went out in the first round anyway.
Sani Kaita
After losing their opening game to Argentina, Nigeria needed to beat Greece to improve their chances of qualifying from their group. The game started well for them when Kala Uche’s free-kick caught the Greeks out. Nigeria were eminently comfortable until Kaita’s moment of madness turned the game. Tussling with Vassilis Torosidis as the ball ran out for a throw-in in a harmless position, Kaita suddenly lost his head and kicked out at the Greek player, who made the post of it. Kaita was shown the red card and Greece made the most of their man advantage, coming back to win 2-1 and all but end Nigeria’s World Cup.